“You only are free when you realize you belong no place — you belong every place — no place at all. The price is high. The reward is great.” — Maya Angelou
This level of belonging takes deep work.
The world is constantly telling us where we do and don’t belong. Social media pulls us into a comparison trap that leaves us questioning whether we measure up. The media tells us which side to choose. We are encouraged to find our people, defend our positions, and draw lines between us and them.
Belonging is a beautiful and deeply human need. But it becomes dangerous when we depend on it to define who we are—or when protecting our place in a group becomes more important than loving the people outside of it.
With upcoming elections and the changes happening within the Catholic Church in the Archdiocese of Dubuque, many of us are thinking about identity, tradition, and where we belong. I see how deeply these identities are ingrained in us, and how easily something that once brought us connection can become something that divides us.
There is a difference between finding comfort in a familiar way of doing things and believing that our way is the only right way.
This summer, when we visited our sister parish in the Dominican Republic, some of our fellow parishioners from Iowa were uncomfortable with aspects of the Mass—the clapping, the singing, and the differences in how the liturgy was celebrated. Cultural differences created a very different worship experience.
It is one thing to feel uncomfortable or even prefer a different style of worship. It is another to judge, criticize, or suggest that a different cultural expression is somehow wrong or makes the Mass invalid.
Our discomfort with something unfamiliar does not make it wrong. And our personal preferences do not determine what is holy.
In a recent group conversation, we were discussing why so many young people have stopped coming to Church. I suggested that until we can welcome people in all their messiness—and can be comfortable loving them right where they are—we will struggle to welcome everyone God is calling into relationship with Him.
How can we invite people into a Church where they belong if our first instinct is to judge whether they fit?
We want to be comfortable. We want things to be neat and tidy. We want to surround ourselves with people who think, act, worship, and believe as we do.
We don’t want to worship in an unfamiliar space. We don’t want a different style of music. We don’t want to struggle to understand a priest who speaks another language. We don’t want to attend Mass at an inconvenient time.
And yet, somewhere along the way, our personal preferences have begun to compete with the very purpose of the Church.
When our comfort becomes a condition of our participation, we risk making ourselves the center of something that was never supposed to be about us.
We say we want people to encounter Christ, but are we willing to be inconvenienced for that encounter? We say we want the Church to grow, but are we willing to make room for people who are different from us? We say we want unity, but are we willing to loosen our grip on the things that make us feel comfortable and secure?
I have been reading Ryan Burge’s book, The Vanishing Church: How the Hollowing Out of Moderate Congregations Is Hurting Democracy, Faith, and Us. The statistics are fascinating, and I would highly recommend reading it.
One line, in particular, stayed with me:
“The Catholic Church in the United States may not be able to resist the fragmentation and division that have become so deeply engrained in American society over the last several years.”
As a Catholic, this is both convicting and an important challenge.
I want with everything I am to resist the fragmentation and division of our society. I believe the Church is meant to be a place where people from all walks of life can encounter Christ—a place where we learn to love beyond our differences, recognize the dignity of every human person, and remember that we are part of something much bigger than ourselves.
And yet, as the people of God, we have fallen far short of creating that kind of environment.
How do we get back to what Christ intended the Church to be?
Perhaps it begins with recognizing that the Church is not ours to shape around our preferences. We are Christ’s to be shaped by His love.
We must move beyond our desire to belong at the expense of others. Beyond our need to be comfortable. Beyond the assumption that the way we have always done things is the way they must always be done.
This doesn’t mean abandoning truth, tradition, or the teachings of our faith. It means examining whether we are holding fast to Christ—or holding fast to ourselves. It means distinguishing between what is essential to our faith and what is simply familiar to us. It means having the humility to recognize that God may be working in ways, and among people, we don’t yet understand.
As our priest, Father Jim Goerend, put it this weekend:
“Jesus appeals to us to look beyond the simplistic politics and the black and white legalism…to realize that we are called to embrace the values centered in a faith that sees the hand of God in all things, and recognizes every human being as part of one human family under the providence of God.”
What if we approached one another with that kind of openness? What if we spent less time defending our place and more time making space for someone else? What if, instead of asking whether someone belongs among us, we asked how God might be inviting us to love them?
We are privileged in this country in so many ways. Perhaps we are so privileged that we have forgotten how much of what we call hardship is simply discomfort. We have the freedom to choose what suits us, the resources to seek what we prefer, and the ability to build lives around our own expectations.
But following Christ asks something more of us.
It asks us to love when it is inconvenient. To listen when we disagree. To welcome when it would be easier to turn away. To surrender our need to be right long enough to recognize the humanity in another person.
It asks us to remember that belonging to Christ will sometimes mean feeling uncomfortable in the company of people who are not like us.
Maybe that is part of the deep work of belonging: learning that we do not have to protect our identity by excluding others. We can be rooted in our faith without being rigid in our preferences. We can hold our convictions without withholding our love. We can find our place in the family of God without deciding who else deserves a place at the table.
God is calling us back to gratitude. Back to openness. Back to service. Back to one another.
Back to Him.
Lord, help us to answer Your call.
